Former Lee economic development employees sue county

Three former Lee Economic Development Office employees are jointly suing the county because they say they were fired for telling the truth during an internal investigation.

The lawsuit filed Monday in U.S. District Court, Fort Myers, claims Lee County violated Florida’s Public Whistle-blowers Act when it terminated Eileen Schuman, John Brock and Susan Noe. The three also claim age and disability discrimination.

Geralyn F. Noonan, attorney for the three former employees, declined to comment.

The 48-page complaint alleges Lee County fired Schuman, Brock and Noe because they disclosed information about “suspected gross mismanagement, malfeasance, misfeasance, gross waste of public funds and gross neglect of duty” committed by other county employees during an internal audit of the Economic Development Office.

Sonja Hurst, a spokeswoman for the Lee County Attorney’s Office, declined to comment Tuesday because the county had not yet seen the lawsuit.

The complaint claims the three former employees pointed to the Economic Development Office’s “extensive, improper use of grant and loan programs,” including the Financial Incentives for Recruiting Strategic Targets (FIRST) fund, which county commissioners created in 2008 to bring high-wage jobs to Lee.

During several interviews, Schuman, Brock and Noe gave Auditor Larry Haut information about a $5 million FIRST economic incentive grant awarded to VR Laboratories, LLC, according to the lawsuit.

The three told Haut that the county “failed to properly investigate VR Labs,” the lawsuit states.

Lee County commissioners approved the FIRST agreement with VR Labs on Feb. 15, 2011. VR Labs promised to create 208 full-time jobs in Lee by 2016, a deadline county commissioners extended to 2017. Lee County gave VR Labs nearly $4.7 million of the incentive award before ending payments in June 2012, according to the county audit.

In January, VR Labs said in a statement it created two jobs.

The lawsuit also includes several accusations against specific people; some who no longer work for Lee County and some who still do.

Lee County asked Jim Moore, former economic development director, to retire as a result of the internal audit, but allowed him to remain in charge of the office for months after his announcement, the lawsuit states. Moore retired Sept. 1.

Glen Salyer, assistant to the county manager who served as interim Economic Development Office director from the date of Moore’s retirement to Jan. 22, first “brought the VR Labs project to Lee County” and was the person who “performed the due diligence study concerning VR Labs,” according to the lawsuit.

Jennifer Berg, former Economic Development Office marketing director, is singled out many times in the former employees’ complaint. Berg is accused in the lawsuit of unethical conduct, of tampering with official documents and of funneling county business to her husband’s company. The county said Berg resigned in May. The lawsuit claims Berg was fired and was allowed to say she resigned.

Berg’s attorney, Robert Pritt, said he had not seen the lawsuit. Still, Pritt maintained its claims against Berg are false.

“If something is put into a complaint, they are pretty free to say whatever they want,” Pritt said. “It doesn’t make it true.”

Benjamin Yormak, an attorney representing Lisa Wagner, another Economic Development employee who filed a similar whistle-blower suit in January against the county, said Lee County has a long history of retaliating against its employees.

“It’s not a coincidence that four of the five people that cooperated in the audit end up jobless,” Yormak said. “That’s a pattern. It’s a pattern to deprive workers of their civil rights.”

The state’s whistle-blower law exists to help workers who have been fired, but it can’t prevent workplace retaliation from happening, Yormak said, adding that the former employees wrongly became vulnerable when they cooperated with the auditor.

“You have a lot of people who had a lot to gain by keeping these whistle-blowers quiet,” Yormak said.